Oregon Play Prize Nearing the Final Round

Owen Carey

The reading and evaluation process for the Oregon Play Prize continues apace!

Of the 131 scripts that were submitted before the January 31, 2016, a little over half were from Portland playwrights; writers from twenty-three other Oregon communities submitted most of the rest. A few writers with deep roots in Oregon who currently reside in other states also offered their work for consideration. A handful of plays were eliminated early on for not meeting the submission criteria (either they’d already been produced or their ties to Oregon were not sufficient).

We have a committee of twenty-four volunteer readers, drawn from Artists Rep staff and the wider theatre community. In Round One of the process, each play was read and scored by at least two of the readers. By late spring, the plays had been winnowed to thirty-three.

Each of these thirty-three plays were given to at least four readers for Round Two. Now, scores are being tallied, and a few plays are making one final round of evaluation, a process that we hope to wrap up by late-June. From this group, the top three will advance to the last round, in which projects descriptions and sample scenes will be posted on this website for the public to vote on their favorite.

Stay tuned -- the three finalists will be posted in July. Get ready to vote!